Wednesday, June 22, 2011

Berkeley: Peoples Movement Assembly June 25, 2011

Check out the Peoples Movements Assembly's Southwest Organizing Tour, including videos from Havasupai, video interviews with Navajo activists in Flagstaff, a report on ethnic cleansing in Tucson and visits to Albuquerque and the US/Mexico 'Berlin Wall':

The Southwest Organizing Tour of the Peoples Movements Assembly (PMA) visited Tucson, Arizona. We contacted Isabel Garcia, Civil and Human Rights Lawyer and she told us of the struggle against the ‘ethnic cleansing’. The visit coincided with the ‘ethnic cleansing’ taking place in public schools in the state. “Acting on a new state law, Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction John Huppenthal has condemned the Tucson Unified School District's controversial Mexican-American studies courses and warned the district could lose a portion of its state funding if it does not comply with the law within 60 days.”

It is known that Gov. Jan Brewer signed the law last year. It bans classes in kindergarten to 12th grade that promote the overthrow of the U.S. government, promote resentment toward a race or class of people, is designed primarily for pupils of one ethnic group or advocate ethnic solidarity. The Tucson district is threatened with $15 million lose, Arizona Department of Education officials said. On Jan. 1, the day the law went into effect, outgoing state Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne announced the courses violated the new law and should be axed. Horne had lobbied for three years for the legislation